


Moments So Dear

by Writeonthrough (Schroederplayspiano)



Category: Pitch (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-20
Updated: 2017-02-20
Packaged: 2018-09-18 21:02:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9402743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schroederplayspiano/pseuds/Writeonthrough
Summary: A series of short drabbles taking place during Mike's last year as a Padre and his first year with Ginny Baker, filling in moments within my "Seasons of Love" four-part universe.





	1. Secrets

**The First Week of November 2017:**

“Okay,” Ginny stepped out of the shower with Mike and reached for towel. He followed her actions. “I know you said you were never letting me go, and don’t get me wrong, I appreciate a man sticking to his word, but you realize I’ve now not been home in eight days and have been wearing your clothes for an entire week.”

Mike kissed her bare shoulder and wrapped a towel around himself. “I’ve certainly realized that as you look so cute in my oversized clothes.”

“Mmm,” she gave up her intentions to bring up returning to her tiny apartment and leaned into him. “They are very comfortable.”

Though her mind relaxed, Mike sensed lingering tension in her body. “We do need to make a run to your apartment at some point, I know. I didn’t mean to keep you hostage.”

“At some point,” she tilted her chin ever so slightly to kiss him. Their lips met once and she closed the distance between them to deepen their kiss. Kissing his beard was still a new experience for her, and she appreciated that it lost some of its volume when it got wet. “But I like you keeping me here. It makes me feel special,” she broke away from him and scurried to his dresser to pick out some new clothes. Raising her voice slightly, she added, “I never thought I’d get an entire week of Mike Lawson all to myself.”

“Really?” He teased, drying off and finding some clean sweatpants and his favorite shirt to put on. “All those years starring at my poster on your wall and you never thought you’d have an entire week alone with me? I’m shocked!”

“Hey!” Ginny gave him a friendly slap from behind. “We’ve talked about this; I did not have your poster on my wall for very long--”

“Oh!” He turned around, resting his arms on her hips. “I must have imagined it when I came over to visit then.”

She snuck out of his embrace and fell back onto the bed with an exacerbated, “Ugh!”

Mike leaned back on the dresser and crossed his arms. “Not to mention the fact that in reciting our life stories to each other yesterday, you told me exactly how that poster came to be on your wall. So, you can’t deny it now—”

“Yeah…remind me again why that was a good idea. Because I sort of feel drained empty from telling you all my secrets.”

“Hmm,” he took the two steps to the bed and flopped himself beside her. The two turned on their sides to face one another, Mike reaching out to trace her dampened curls on her cheeks. “But that’s the point. We both tell each other everything so our emptiness is replaced by the other’s deep secrets.”

“Oh, right…” Ginny nodded along. “Did you happen to mention any embarrassing secrets yesterday? No? Huh.”

He pulled back, somewhat offended. “First of all, you should not be embarrassed that you have my poster on your wall. I. Love. It. Second, I told you about the times when my mom forced me to lie to my coaches to get money, right?”

She dropped her victorious attitude. “You shouldn’t be embarrassed about that either.”

“I respect my coaches, Ginny.”

“I know you do,” she whispered, reaching out to stroke his cheek.

A cell phone beeped in their silence. But, in much the same way that they had all week, they both ignored it, not realizing its importance.

Evelyn Sanders (35 missed calls):  
Text Message:  
WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?


	2. Surprises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey guys! Thank you for expressing your excitement for this series, both in your comments/kudos/subscriptions here and in your comments in “Seasons of Love.” After playing around with some different formatting options, I have decided that the timeline will not be linear so I can write to your requests (please share what you want to see in the comments!), and not wait to share my favorite missing moments. Sort of like how they do out-of-order flashbacks on Pitch or on Dan Fogelman’s other show “This Is Us”
> 
> When I don’t have a request or want to hold my own favorite missing moment, I will return to the drabbles’ original plan—to share one missing moment for each week of the year. I wanted the title to be 52 Moments So Dear, but 52 drabbles is a daunting task—But who knows!?! If you guys continue to love the series and share your enthusiasm, maybe we’ll get there. It depends on you guys as much as it depends on me. ❤️ For now, let’s just enjoy the moment, shall we? xoxo.
> 
> Moment #2: Requested by romanceisreal: "When the team talks to Ginny about her statement to make sure it's okay with her"

**The Third Week of October 2018:**

“Ginny!” Evelyn whispered sharply over the players currently crowding her Fairy-lights lit backyard. Stepping away from the playoff celebrations, Ginny watched her best friend sneak up and looped an arm through her elbow. “Have you talked to the team yet about your brilliant plan for Mike’s gift,” she squeezed her arm, squealing, “Your life-changing, secret-relationship-outing kiss at the end of the World Series?”

“Shhh!” Ginny waved a hand, motioning for Evelyn to quiet her sharp whisper. Pulling her friend close, she moved her face to Evelyn’s ear. “I haven’t had a chance. Mike hasn’t left the team alone since we qualified for playoffs. It’s like he’s redoubling his efforts to enjoy everybody with the extra time he has left.”

Evelyn pulled back to with a questioning look. “He can still hang out with the team after he retires. He’s not dying, crazy girl.”

“I know that.” Ginny rolled her eyes.

“Does he?” Evelyn kept her skeptical expression.

When Ginny hesitated in her response, Evelyn released her and marched straight to Mike. Lounging beside Blip with a handful of teammates by their blue lit pool, he lowered his beer at her dramatic entrance.

“Hey Ev…Whatzup?”

“Ice,” she demanded.

“What?”

“We need ice. I need you to go out and get us some ice.”

Blip scrutinized his wife. “Babe, we’re not out of ice.”

“Yes, we are,” she lied. “And I need Mike to leave his precious team alone for twenty minutes and go get us some ice.”

“Ev…” Mike noticed the edge in her voice. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” she dropped her shoulders along with her attitude. “Everything’s fine. I just…” she scrunched up her face into a cute expression. “Really need some ice.”

“Alright then,” he stood and brushed off his jeans. “I’m off to get some ice.”

Victorious, she shoved her hands in pockets and swung her shoulders back and forth. “You’re the best, Mike. Thank you.”

Walking out, Mike met Ginny on the porch. “Apparently, Evelyn needs some ice. So, I’m off.”

“Well,” Ginny placed a hand on his shoulder and tilted her head. “That’s very nice of you.”

He pinched his brow for a moment, questioning what she wasn’t saying, but he soon forgot the thought when Patterson walked past them and she released him; the loss of touch more meaningful than the wondering if, or what, the two girl friends were up to something.

Sighing, he took a step back. “And here I was hoping I might steal a kiss goodbye.”

“Two more weeks, Old Man,” she frowned at him.

“I’ll see you later, Rookie,” shaking his head, he turned towards the Sanders’ garden gate for an unneeded ice run.

Clenching her teeth and tightening her hands into fists, she watched him leave with new determination. Just like Evelyn minutes before, she marched up to the crowd around Blip and announced:

“I need to do it now.”

“Do what?” Blip smirked at her seriousness. “Out your relationship to the press now or tell the team your plan? Because I can call the papers—”

“A little less sarcasm and a more support here would be great, thanks.”

“Fine.” He stood and stepped on a bench to get everyone’s attention. “Hey Padres! Listen up!”

Chatter in the Sanders’ backyard fell silent, accentuating the brisk fall night. Ginny made the most of the team’s unusual silence (along with Mike’s rare absence) and spoke up, “I have announcement, slash, favor to ask you—”

“Actually, Ginny,” Blip cut in. “I wasn’t done with my announcement,” he winked at her.

“Oh,” she raised flat palms in innocence. “My bad, please continue.”

He shook his head at her cute act, prompting lighthearted jeers from the rest of the team. He let them give her a hard time for a moment and then continued. “Before you share your retirement gift to Mike with them, we wanted to share our retirement gift to Mike with you to make sure you’re okay with it.”

Ginny protruded her chin, conveying her confusion. “Why would you need my permission?”

“Because,” Sonny chimed in with a cocky smile, “It involves you.”

She narrowed her eyes at the team jokester, “What?” she asked him, and then looked to Blip.

Finally, a genuine, wide smile appeared on his face. “Well, for you and Mike…We’ve been noticing Mike quiet disappointment every time he has to hide his relationship with you or withhold affection for you…and while we appreciate the respect—especially me, because honesty, Ginny, I do not need to see any more than I already do—”

“Blip!” Evelyn warned.

“Right, sorry,” he quickly recovered. “Anyway, the team’s been talking and we thought it best to give him a written statement to the press in support of your relationship at the end of the season—”

“What?” Ginny spoke out her disbelief and covered her smile with a hand.

Sonny interjected, “If that’s okay with you.”

“Of course that’s okay,” she exclaimed. “Mike is going to freak! I don’t know what I ever did to deserve you guys.”

Smiles broke out around the backyard. “We got your back, girl,” a voice without a face in the evening’s dim light said, but she recognized it as Livan’s.

“That’ll go perfectly with my surprise for him—”

“OoOo,” Sonny started. “What surprise?”

“—If, that is, you guys are okay with it—”

Deciding that Ginny took too long for the lead-in, Evelyn made the announcement in one rushed breath: “Ginny’s planning on kiss-tackling Mike, outing their relationship at the end of his last game! How sweet is that!”

“Ev!” Blip and Ginny objected together.

The rest of the team, however, didn’t express their objections, and Dusty was the first to voice the team’s approval, “Well, it’s about damn time, Baker.”


	3. Promises

The Second Week of November:

Evelyn Sanders (1 missed call):  
Text Message:  
Here. Where u @?

Ginny opened the passenger car door before the vehicle came to a complete stop in front of her apartment. “Evelyn!” She spotted her friend fidgeting on her doorstep. “Hey! Sorry I’m late!”

Evelyn heard Ginny’s voice before she noticed her friend through wimpy bushes. She leaned to watch her running up the walkway. “You were out? Before 10am? And here I was thinking I’d find you in PJs, bringing you your first coffee of the day.”

“Second cup,” Ginny noted gratefully, taking the warm cup out of Evelyn’s hands and pulling a key from her pocket to let themselves inside, a revive from the morning’s fall chill.

“Something’s off…” Evelyn entered slowly with a wrinkled brow and a wide-eyed gaze.

Tugging her jacket closer (instead of taking it off once inside), Ginny shuffled to the thermostat and turned up the heat. “What do you mean?”

“Well,” Evelyn pivoted on her heel and tiled her head, emphasizing the word and causing her long wavy curls to flip around her face. “You’re out of bed—not to mention out of your house, in the off-season, before 10am. You’ve already had your first cup of coffee and you just turned up the heat in this freezing apartment that looks like it hasn’t been lived in by Ginny Baker—the drop and go girl—in weeks.”

Ginny placed the coffee cup on the entry way table along with her keys, crossed her arms and examined her friend. “‘The drop and go girl?’”

“You know, there’s always jackets and gear thrown over the couch and shoved in wall corners. Now? No gear? No discarded clothes?”

“It’s the off-season, Ev! I have no gear to leave out.”

“Hmm. Uh-huh. Sure.” Evelyn walked further into the apartment, only to find more evidence supporting the theory growing in her mind. Ginny picked up her coffee cup and followed her through the kitchen before settling down on the couch as Evelyn made her final inspection around the apartment. “Your bed is made too. You never make your bed.”

“Ev…”

Marching up to the couch, Evelyn stood before Ginny and stared her down. “You’re already living with him?”

Mike’s image flashed before her. _No way…Ev couldn’t possibly know where and with who she was spending all of her time._ She protruded her chin and bulged her eyes. “I’m not living with—With who? What are you talking about?”

“No. Uh-huh. Stop.” Evelyn stepped closer. “You don’t get to play dumb with me. Today is the first day I’ve seen you in two and a half weeks. It looks like you haven’t been in your own apartment in that amount of time. I know there’s a guy.” She paused for a breath after her rant, the momentarily silence and Ginny’s guilty expression triggering the last time Evelyn saw her alone with a guy: Mike Lawson walking her to a car after the Padres’ playoffs celebration. Through the bar’s glass window front, Evelyn noted their closeness and Mike’s lingering touch on Ginny’s arm. “And I know who the guy is—”

“I need you not to know who the guy is,” Ginny panicked, holding onto the promise she made herself to keep her personal relationship with Mike a secret. “Seriously, I can’t talk to you if—”

Evelyn’s freak out at the non-confirmation, confirmation cut her off. Between the wide-smile squeal and the rapid shift from flapping hands in excitement to contorting them in determination, her reaction increased Ginny’s panic.

Her friend noticed her apprehension and relaxed, momentarily losing her animation. Evelyn sat next to Ginny and placed a reassuring hand on her knee. A pair of brown eyes met another pair. Evelyn finally matched Ginny’s serious tone, saying quickly, “I don’t know who the guy is. How on earth would I know who the guy is without you telling me. The point is,” she raised her hand from Ginny’s knee and pointed over her shoulder. “There’s a guy!” she couldn’t help squealing. “A guy who has got you so enthralled, you don’t talk to your best friend for two and half weeks!”

“Ev—”

“And the point is—you now owe me those,” she enunciated her next three words. “Vivid. Electrifying. Details you promised me—”

Ginny squeezed her features and pulled back in disbelief. “I did not promise—”

Her friend scooted closer. “Does the carpet match the face? Was it like—sweet and tender or like—desperate ‘I got to have you now’ type of thing? Or—has it been both of those and everything in between?”

“Evelyn!” Bringing her knees up, she slapped a pillow. “Can you slow down?” The same palm rose between them. “And you have to promise—swear to me you won’t—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I swear I won’t say anything to anyone, including—and especially Blip. Now…” A sly smile spread across Evelyn’s face. “Is he as good as he looks?” She asked a final question and then waited for Ginny’s answer.

And that’s when a blush crept over her skin and heated her cheeks. The same sly smile Evelyn wore asking for private details appeared on Ginny’s face. Unable to hold herself together much longer, the rigidness in her body released and she fell back against the couch pillows. “He’s so much better…”

More squeals erupted in Evelyn and soon Ginny joined in. Joy filled replaced the rigidness in her bones and a buried giddiness in Ginny broke through; allowing her to celebrate the major life milestone being with one’s soulmate for the first time since it happened.

Like what often happens during important girl talks, both Evelyn and Ginny lost track of the time. Perhaps it was out of pure joy of celebrating finding her soulmate, or perhaps she insisted on keeping the lid on her details of her personal life too tight for too long, but once she started revealing details to Evelyn, she could not stop.

Too busy chatting away, Ginny missed Mike’s notifications on her phone:

Mike (2 missed calls):  
3 Text Messages:  
And now I can’t go 3 hrs w/o hearing from u?  
Where ru? & what have u done 2 me Baker?  
U promised it wouldn't come to this


	4. Happiness

**The Second Week of December:**

“Arriving in separate cars is completely unnecessary, don’t you think?” Mike asserted to Ginny across his car roof after waiting for her to park and step out.

She tugged her jacket closer after encountering the crisp night’s air. “No,” she stood her ground. “It’s crucial.”

Mike scoffed, shook his head, and started walking towards the restaurant where they were meeting Evelyn and Blip for dinner. “You do know you are putting protecting our relationship over protecting the environment, right?”

Ginny shoved her hands in her pockets and followed him. “Mike…” she warned.

“Two things,” he turned back. “One, I’ve given you rides to team dinners before. And two, we’re still, apparently, going to show up at the restaurant together, so your concern is kind of moot.”

“This isn’t a team dinner. This is dinner with four people, two of which are married and other two are secretly together.” Ginny responded as softly as she could. Then, she addressed the hurt on his face. “Why don’t you spit the third thing out why you’re at it?”

Mike’s forehead creased and he narrowed his eyes. “What third thing?”

“The loudest thing you’re saying but not actually saying.”

After a beat of comprehension, he swallowed, lost his confused expression and replaced it with a softer, regretful one. “Ginny…”

She kept her quiet and compassionate composure, whispering, “We’ve been doing this for a month now, and you’re already tired of hiding it.”

“No…” He reassured her seriously, stopping to wait for her to come closer. She surprised him by stepping into his personal space, barely brushing against him. “Hiding it is sexy…I like sharing a secret with you and having you all to myself. I knew what I was getting into, I promise you. That’s not it.”

She lifted one shoulder and tilted her head in its direction; a move which Mike couldn’t help noting its cuteness. “Then what is it?”

“It’s…” he thought he had his answered planned out, but as he looked at her—the nippy wind blowing through her curls and her nose tucked into her jacket’s collar so all he could see was her wide, bright, questioning eyes—he found the words to express the feeling nagging him for days. “You’re beautiful, Ginny. You’re fun and smart and make so happy.” Emotions started to overwhelm him. He took a deep breath and swallowed. “Happier than I’ve been…maybe ever. You have no idea…”

Heat rushed to her cheeks that had nothing to do with the cold. She broke their eye contact and looked down at her ugs. “Mike…

“I just want to show you off, to be with you, to let my friends see how happy I am,” he confessed, causing Ginny to close her eyes with guilt—her freak out with Evelyn once again looping in her mind, their giggles echoing in her head. “And I know, later, I’ll get a chance to do that. And it’ll be worth the wait…it’s just…I’m happy, Ginny.”

“And I’m happy too, Mike…I hope you know—”

“Ginny!”

Her hair spun around her as she turned back to find Evelyn. She smiled at her and ran the remaining five feet to embrace her from behind. “Aah!” Swaying Ginny back and forth, she rested her chin on her shoulder.

Noting her over-the-top enthusiasm out of character, Ginny patted her hand twice and searched for Blip. “Is she drunk already?”

Both men chuckled. “No,” Blip assured her. “She hasn’t seen you since Thanksgiving and gets a little stir crazy when hasn’t had her girl times—”

“That’s right. Crazy.” Evelyn bulged her eyes, emphasizing the adjective. She stood straight after releasing Ginny and smoothed out her shirt. “So…you remember that Mike.”

Both Mike and Ginny gaped at her for different reasons; Ginny, out of horror at her implication of a hint of a suggestion she knew their secret, and Mike at the seemingly random suggestion.

“I’m pretty sure I have nothing to do with whether or not you two see each other,” his eyebrows furrowed for a moment before walking ahead.

Ginny managed to breathe again only after Evelyn saved her wink until both men’s backs were turned.


	5. Anniversaries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey, hey, hey! So…Whoops, it’s been a while, but hopefully not too long for you guys to lose interest. I wanted to give special care to this important moment and extra long drabble. :-P One of my absolute favorite drabbles featuring none other than Jordan Collins is coming up next! ♥︎ Happy that the Pitch renew news is at least going in the right direction.
> 
> Enjoy (And sorry for the feels)!

**The Third Week of November:**

Pounding the door increased to the point where Ginny couldn’t ignore it any longer. Still holding the phone, she rolled from the bed, and dropped to the floor with thud.

“What was that noise?” Her brother’s voice boomed from the speaker.

“My knees hitting the cold hardwood floor.”

“Remind me again why you don’t have a carpet in your bedroom,” Will held onto his brotherly concern from the better part of their conversation.

The knocks at the door continued. Ginny sighed once more before forcing herself up. “I don’t think today, of all days, is a good time for you to be hounding me about interior design…do you?”

Will’s silence answered her question. She waited for him to speak, their silence now different than the previous minutes filled with speechless comfort and solace. “I think I get a pass at snapping at you today.”

“Fair enough,” rounding the corner, she halted and stared at the front door. The knocks stopped for a moment.

“Maybe they left.”

She shook her head at him even though he couldn’t see her. “They didn’t leave.”

“You know who it is?” Will’s astonishment clear in his voice.

“Yeah…” Ginny forced herself through the entryway to open the door, not surprised to find a worried Mike Lawson on the other side.

Though some relief rushed over him when she appeared in the doorway, however, his previous the worry and anger didn’t leave his face. “I have been calling you all morning!”

The classic Ginny Baker fight response in her already gone, she simply nodded at him and looked passed him as if he wasn’t there. A beat passed in which Mike emphasized his expression, waiting for an explanation and then she raised the phone back to her mouth. “I have to go now, Will.”

“Call me back if you need to. Be nice to yourself today.”

“Yup. You too.” She hung up, shoved the phone in the back pocket of her sweats, but still looked passed the man before her.

Mike replayed her brother’s words and examined her vacant expression. “Is everything ok? What’s wrong?”

Despite softening his tone, Ginny still winced at his words. Whether from the wince or the concern, she finally looked at him and some of her usual spunk returned. “I could ask you the same question. What the hell wasn’t clear about the note I left you?”

“Your note?” He eyebrows raised as he pulled from his pocket, reading: “‘Went home for the night. Didn’t want to wake you. Will call if I want to talk. Everything fine.’”

“Huh,” Ginny muttered, peering over the paper. “I forgot the apostrophe ‘S’ after everything. Damn. I guess that’s what happens when you write a note at 11:30 at night.”

“You think I’m here because I want to talk punctuation?” Mike retorted harshly.

“I’d give a lot for that to be the reason you’re here.”

“Ginny…” he pleaded, half-wondering why she hadn’t let him inside. When she didn’t move or speak, he went back to where he started. “I have been calling you all morning.”

“Yes. I know,” she stood straighter. “And I take issue with the fact that you’ve been calling all morning after I tried to be responsible and left that very thoughtful and considerate note—”

“Thoughtful and considerate!” He cried out.

“—Which was hard to do if you can believe!”

“You couldn’t pick up the phone? Answer one of my texts? Letting me know where you were and you were okay?”

Anger started to twitch at her face. She snatched the note from his hand. “I did you one better. You got a special, handwritten note saying just that!” Realizing her note was never going to be enough of an explanation, she crinkled into a ball and stuffed it in her pocket. “I was talking to my brother all morning; I didn’t want to cut him off to tell you the same thing my note said.”

He swallowed to restart, trying again to calm himself. “What’s. Wrong?”

“Ugh!” Ginny threw her arms in the air, released her hold on the door, turned his back to him, and stormed back into her apartment.

Like she expected, Mike followed her, shutting the door behind him. “You know, relationships only work if you talk to me. I can’t be there for you if don’t let me.”

“Mike Lawson.” Once in her cluttered living room, Ginny turned back to face him, picking up a sweatshirt and wrung it around her arms. “Relationship expert!”

“Ginny Baker,” he shoved hands in his pockets. “Master of the emotional dodge!”

She froze at his call out. Her gaze collided with his. Beneath his aggressive attempt to connect—to find a way into her, she noticed his hurt and concern. Sighing, she lost her edge and tossed the sweatshirt onto the couch. An empathetic expression formed on her face and she ran her fingers through her curls. “Look, Mike…”

“Is it me?” His insecurity blurted out the moment it had a chance. He shifted uncomfortably from one leg to the other. “Just tell me what I did wrong and I’ll fix it. I’m sorry for whatever—”

“No, no,” Ginny dropped her hands and took her first step towards him.

“And I hated waking up without you. I didn’t even know how much I would until I realized this morning is the first morning I haven’t woken up with you beside me. And I could tell, Ginny. I could tell something was wrong before I even opened my eyes—I just wish you would feel comfortable talking to me instead of running away in the middle of the night—”

“No, Mike, it isn’t you. You didn’t do anything wrong. I am comfortable talking to you. You know that.”

“Okay, then,” he lowered his voice, stepped closer, and tilted his head. “Talk to me.”

He steadied her darting eyes, noticing their teary quality. The moment he prepared to say something comforting, she finally shared, “Mike, today is my dead dad’s birthday and it’s just…hitting me harder than I thought, okay? My brother and I always spend the day together and now we’re in separate states and I didn’t want to get into it and get upset at midnight, in your bed. So…”

“Oh, Ginny…” Immediately heartbroken and regretful, he pulled his hands from his pockets and reached for her. They were close enough that he could comfortably run his fingers up her arm to stroke her cheek. “I’m so sorry.”

A frown appeared on her face at his words, but she did her best to shrug them off with a shoulder lift and a half smile. After a beat, she lowered herself to the couch and Mike sat next to her, patiently waiting for her to speak, running a comforting hand across her back. She adjusted her hair to one side and took a breath. “You’d think after all these years, it wouldn’t affect me this much. I only really allow myself to let myself be sad about him two days during the year—in November 19th and August 3rd—his birthday and the day that we got in that stupid crash…”

His hand stilled. “Wait…you were in the car with your dad when he—”

She spun around at his surprised tone, only to see it reflected in his expression. “Yeah…on the drive home from the state championships, after the Padres scout came to talk to us…Drunk driver came out of nowhere and…” Her brow pinched together. “But you knew that…I’m sure I mentioned that before…”

“You’ve mentioned the crash in regards to your dad, I didn’t know that you were with him.” He made sure to keep his tone at a smooth, comforting whisper, while he reached up to stroke her hair. He examined her closely when he added a lighter observation of, “That somehow didn’t come up in the telling of our life stories twenty-two days ago.”

Embarrassed and somewhat appalled, Ginny’s shoulders rose with an inhale she refused to release, her lips forming a guilty ‘oh.’ Mike silently eased her anxiety, brought a hand from her back to her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. Despite his assurance, on her exhale she promised, “I’m sorry. I-I meant to—I mean I thought you knew—I-I-” Her shoulders dropped. “I don’t like to talk about it and I thought it was pretty much common knowledge. I didn’t think I was keeping it from you or something—”

“No, I know,” he tried nodding at her, using their nonverbal secret language to reinforce his support and understanding. Whether she noticed it or not was unclear to him. So, he restated, “I know you weren’t.”

“Okay,” she took another deep breath and ran her hands over her face. “Good.”

After noticing wrinkles on her forehead begin to smooth, the corners of his lips tugged upwards and he added a lighter, “You know, there’s not a lot of common knowledge out there about Ginny Baker. I count myself among the rare and the lucky that you share glimpses into your soul just with me,” he tucked a hair strand behind her ear. “Because if they were common knowledge, I’m pretty sure the whole team would fall in love with you.”

Curving into his touch, her cheek leaned against his palm. “Mike…”

“Not that I could, necessarily, blame them—although I think it might crush my own soul a little bit if that were true.”

A smile broke on Ginny’s face and she playfully leaned into him. He took the opportunity to pull her closer, bringing his other hand to cup her face as he swooped in to kiss her.

Their lips met briefly, but her upturned lips from her smile struggled to hold onto his. A small chuckle came from Ginny as she raised a palm to his chest to lightly push away from him. He released her lips and rested his forehead against hers to maintain intimate contact.

“You’ve been counting the number of days we’ve been together?” She whispered as their noses brushed together.

Mike leaned on her forehead further, increasing the pressure slightly as he looked deeply into her eyes. “Haven’t you?”

She nodded against him, “Thirty days and counting, tomorrow’s our one month anniversary…I just didn’t think you were.”

“Of course I was,” he whispered back. Ginny felt his forehead lower when he leaned in to capture her lips. She kissed him deeply this time, her hands wrapping around his neck, fingers combing through his back hairs. Mike encircled her back, relishing their physical and emotional closeness.

After a few beats, Ginny opened her eyes for more insight into his quietness. She placed a finger under his chin and raised it until their eyes met.

Still processing the news that she had been with her father when he died, more empathy and respect poured out of him. He asked her quietly, “Do you want to call your brother back?”

Ginny pulled back slightly, straightening her posture, and shook her head slowly with pride. “No…I want to sit here with you and tell you exactly what happened.”

Mike adjusted his position on the couch to face her. A gratified smile appearing on his face, “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

From that day on, Mike Lawson knew all the details of the last day Ginny Baker had with her dad. He knew everything except the part Jordan Collins and his family played in it. That detail was too much heartbreak for Ginny to divulge in one day. That equaling surprising and devastating story would have to be saved for after the two best friends’ fated reunion on Valentine’s Day.

**Author's Note:**

> Usually, I have a little more chill, but I lost it :P - So, don't forget to leave a comment, enticing me to update faster! ♥︎ Much love to Baswson fans!
> 
> Also - If you have a drabble idea or request inspired by or mentioned directly within "Seasons of Love," or have a new idea you'd like to see in this universe, be sure to let me know in the comments! Thanks!


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